I just retired a few months ago (the week of Thanksgiving), and my husband is retiring at the end of April. We are both still pretty young, as far as retirees go, and in really good health. Our original retirement plan was to sell our house in the big-city boom town where we currently live and move to Kansas. There are two good reasons why we made this decision. First, the Husband is from Kansas and almost his entire family still lives there, where they are awaiting us with open arms. Second, the cost of living is much lower there, and I would not have to get another job. I was fortunate enough to retire young, and could reasonably have another career. So, it was decided.
Then, I starting turning over in my mind what our life might be like in Kansas. I became more and more concerned with my happiness quotient living there, considering my tendency to get very bored with monotony. The Husband would probably be very happy, with his best-friend and first cousin there to pal around with. He lives in a very nice farming community where it’s pretty fun to drive tractors around and talk about growing hay a lot. It’s a nice place to visit.
My retirement date got closer and closer. I absolutely wanted to retire, and was working to get my replacements trained to take over the duties I performed, but I was having a lot of anxiety about the whole moving to Kansas plan.
While talking to the Daughter one evening, I was saying how I would like to travel a little bit between moving-out here and moving-in there. I just know that when the Husband gets back to Kansas, he will never leave again. Somehow that evening, the discussion progressed to where a new plan emerged, and it was very exciting. I would just have to sell it to the Husband. The Daughter would have to sell it to the Son-in-law, too.
So, here’s the revised plan:
The Husband and I would travel the world for a while (at least two years) before we sell our house and make the big move to Kansas. During that time, the Daughter and her husband could lease our house and take care of the place. That would give them the opportunity to save some money to buy their own place when we return.
So, that very evening, when the Husband got home, and we were sitting on the porch talking, I asked him what he thought of the revised plan. I had envisioned having to work to persuade him by using some tears, some pleading, some bargaining. But, after I outlined the revised plan, he paused a minute, and said, Okay. Just like that. Okay.
The Son-in-law had the same response. Okay. Just like that.
Well, okay. So, that is why the name of this blog is called The Long Way to Kansas. We’re going to Kansas, but we’re taking the very longest way around that I can think of.
So, the next few months will be spent getting ready to go. I’ll let you know the progress of cleaning out all our stuff, giving away the furniture (I hate the living room stuff), packing up and storing the stuff we can’t part with, getting our documentation together, settling on destinations, and all the rest of the fun stuff to come.
